


Mutually Assured Destruction Works Only As Long As It Works

by sunken_standard



Series: It's Always the Losing Side [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post TFP, Sherlolly - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-15
Updated: 2017-02-15
Packaged: 2018-09-24 14:33:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9763007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunken_standard/pseuds/sunken_standard
Summary: It wasn't nearly enough; it was something.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Post TFP. Follows [It's Always The Losing Side](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9557489) and [Double Bind](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9648275).
> 
> A million thanks to my beta, madder_badder, who always knows just how to fix something to make it _right_.

 

He used his key to let himself into her flat; he didn't care if it was appropriate, he was crashing _hard_ and he needed to see her. He shed his coat and jacket on the way to the stairs.

 

Should have phoned first, probably, but he couldn't do it over the phone. He couldn't hear the no.

 

She was standing in the doorway to her bedroom by the time he made it upstairs. No dressing gown, just pants and a t-shirt, her hair loose, mobile clutched in her hand.

 

She didn't relax when she saw him.

 

"What—?"

 

He didn't have words, he had too many of them.

 

She moved aside when he got close; he slipped past her into the bedroom, toed off his shoes while unbuttoning his shirt.

 

"Sherlock," she started, tentative; paused.

 

She wasn't stupid, she knew there was something wrong. She was afraid. Preparing for the worst.

 

He shrugged out of his shirt and made sure she got a good look at his arms.

 

"Still clean. I just need somewhere to sleep." It wasn't a lie, just not the truth by half.

 

"Tell me what happened."

 

"I will. I will. I promise I will. Later."

 

Fine tremors ran through his muscles, exhaustion. Still not back to peak physical condition, not as young as he used to be.

 

He stepped out of his trousers, kicked them aside. Hooked a finger in a sock, pulled it off, then the other.

 

She was debating what to do, who she should phone.

 

He took her hands, eased the phone from her grasp, led her along when he deposited it on the bedside table.

 

"Please." He groped behind himself with his free hand, pulled down the blankets, sat.

 

"Just give me something, Sherlock, you're scaring me."

 

"I..." he struggled. Where to start. "I don't want you to die."

 

"I wasn't planning on it anytime soon?"

 

"Molly, please." It wasn't an admonition.

 

She was looking at him, into him, fighting a war with herself. She hadn't let go of his hand. Yet.

 

"You'll tell me what the hell that was about today." It was somewhere between a question and a command.

 

"I will. Later. Please. Just sleep with me."

 

She made an involuntary movement backward before she realized what he was asking (though still unsure).

 

He was running out of _please, Mollys_ so he begged with his eyes instead. Nothing put-on, wouldn't work on her anyway.

 

She relented, let go of his hand. Rounded the bed, slid back under the covers, lay flat on her back with her hands folded over her stomach like a corpse.

 

He wasn't as gentle as he could have been when he rolled onto his side and pulled her onto hers to face him. She let herself be manhandled until she was arranged somewhat comfortably against his chest, his arms tight around her.

 

_I'm sorry I'm sorry but you're here, we're here, it's alright, it's going to be alright._

 

"I won't let anyone hurt you. Ever." He said it quietly into the part of her hair, his eyes closed tightly.

 

She struggled to push back, to look up at him.

 

"Was someone going to hurt me?" Slow, deliberate. Apprehensive.

 

"My sister."

 

_Don't think about her right now, tomorrow, do it all tomorrow, remember tomorrow._

 

"I didn't know—"

 

"Neither did I. Later. Please. Five people died today." _Almost six._

 

"Oh," barely a whisper. Her arms came around him, finally, finally.

 

And then, "Is it over?"

 

He nodded, words gone again. Wanted to ask her the same thing. He wasn't naive enough to think that her acquiescence now meant a future together was a certainty.

 

"Okay." She settled into his arms, not quite comfortably but allowing herself to be held, holding him.

 

It wasn't nearly enough; it was something.

 

*

 

"I have to go to work," she said.

 

He held her tighter; he'd just fallen asleep. He didn't want to be alone.

 

"No you don't."

 

"I do. I used all my time when Mary..." Her voice trailed off; she didn't want to be reminded.

 

He loosened his hold.

 

She slipped away and shut herself up in the bathroom. He rolled into the warm spot she'd left.

 

*

 

She was late coming back from work.

 

He hovered in the doorway between the lounge and the entryway, watching as she peeled off her gloves, unlooped her scarf.

 

"I um, talked to your brother today," she said, not meeting his eyes.

 

Of course she did. Nothing short of the thermal death of the universe would stop Mycroft's meddling.

 

"How much did he tell you?" The bare minimum, to be sure.

 

"Enough," she said, facing him, making eye contact, glancing away just as fast. "How are your hands?"

 

He held them out, steady; they weren't as bad as they could have been. Barely swollen, though tender.

 

She examined them, ran her thumb along rough skin where he'd pulled out a splinter.

 

She stepped back, took off her coat, hung it on the peg. Slid by him, straight to the kitchen to wash her hands, start tea.

 

She stopped short in front of the breakfast bar.

 

"Is that...?"

 

"PE-4, yes. And the cameras. I got them all." He'd lined them up neatly; he never could resist a touch of the dramatic and the impact of the visual was important. Context.

 

"Christ," she said, wobbling on her feet. "Why?"

 

_You know why_. He couldn't say that to her, though.

 

"She was trying to hurt me."

 

Molly gave the breakfast bar a wide berth, continued to the sink.

 

Two mugs; automatic. He took it as a good sign.

 

"I always thought I was safe," she said, staring at the teabag she'd just dropped into her mug.

 

"You are, I promise. She's not going to hurt anyone again."

 

He didn't know if the second part was true. He hoped, at least.

 

Her silence was worrying. He knew she was waiting for an apology, _the_ apology, but he couldn't do it.

 

He simply wasn't sorry.

 

At least, not about that. He was sorry they'd both been robbed of a choice, and that it had pained her to say it, pained her to hear it; he was sorry for the anguish after and the new fear that came with being in the crosshairs.

 

He wasn't sorry it was finally out in the open.

 

He'd always known, of course he had, but he hadn't believed it. He hadn't understood it. Tried to deny it. There had been hundreds of _what-ifs_ and _if-onlys_ over the years, fleeting thoughts he swallowed and swallowed and swallowed until they were just another rock in his gut.

 

And for her part... he'd assumed he'd ruined it long ago. He'd thought her engagement the final proof; he'd had her friendship, it had been enough.

 

The sex was something they both tried to forget.

 

She exhaled heavily, filled the mugs.

 

"I'd rather not have those," she gestured to the end of the breakfast bar, "lying around. Or in my flat at all."

 

"They'll be gone by tomorrow. I have a meeting with Mycroft in the afternoon. And my parents."

 

"Oh," she said. She looked up, finally looked _at_ him for the first time since she'd got home.

 

Her eyes were wide and dark with sympathy; for them, for him, for Mycroft. For Victor's parents.

 

It was his turn to look away.

 

She fished the teabags out of the mugs, fixed his first. She moved it a foot down the worktop rather than handing it to him; an invitation to come closer.

 

He took it for what it was, stood next to her. Stirred his tea for something to do, didn't move away again.

 

She turned, leaned back against the worktop. Stirred her own tea.

 

"Why were you having a bad day yesterday?" he asked finally. He had to start somewhere.

 

"One of my friends from primary school died. Ovarian cancer. She left three kids."

 

"Young," he said, redundant. He was never good at this sort of thing, even if he was beginning to allow himself to understand loss.

 

She gave a half-shrug. It is what it is.

 

She stared into her mug, lifted it to her mouth, blew on it. "Where are you staying?"

 

He wondered what she was asking. Was it an invitation, possibly a proposition (highly doubtful after last time, but he didn't know much of anything anymore), or was it a subtle hint that his presence was no longer welcome?

 

"I have places here and there," he said vaguely, trying not to give away hope or disappointment.

 

"You can stay here, if you like." She didn't look at him, sipped her tea.

 

"Thank you." He wasn't sure what the offer meant.

 

He took a drink of his own tea, buying time.

 

"Yesterday—" he began, stopped.

 

She tensed.

 

"I don't want to pretend it never happened." Not like we have been with everything else.

 

"I don't think we could pretend," she said, gripping her mug with both hands, her lips hovering just above the rim.

 

"No," he agreed.

 

The conversation stalled again; he didn't know how to say everything he wanted to and Molly didn't want to say anything.

 

"Relationships aren't really my area." It was an explanation, an apology for any future missteps.

 

Molly's shoulders hunched ever so slightly. "I know," she said.

 

Of course she would take it the wrong way.

 

"What I mean to say is I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know how to... go about... having one." He stumbled over the words, feeling more like a sixteen year old than when he'd actually been sixteen.

 

She laughed, a humorless, bitter little thing. "Having one is easy. Keeping it, not so much."

 

He wasn't sure if she was twisting his words on purpose to avoid what he was trying to get at, or if she sincerely believed that it was so far outside the realm of possibility that she'd discounted it entirely.

 

"But if you love someone—"

 

She flinched, shut down. "Love isn't always enough," she said, staring straight ahead. She took a drink of tea to swallow whatever bitter pill had just crossed her mind.

 

"Then what else is there?"

 

He didn't understand why this was so difficult. Why she was being so difficult, why she'd been making it difficult for months.

 

"Trust," she said, a knife in his heart. "Respect. Empathy. Selflessness."

 

She put her mouth on the rim of her mug again, held it there.

 

He felt all those things, they'd had all that between them for years. Could she really not see that?

 

"Wh—" He began to form a question, any question; couldn't.

 

"I think," she said softly. "I think you had a scare yesterday and right now you're looking for something—"

 

"I'm not a child!" It was sharper than he'd intended, louder. He'd never shouted at her before.

 

She looked at him then, anger in her eyes a magnesium flare.

 

"No, you're not." She kept her tone even. "Tell me this, Sherlock. Yesterday, if I'd just gone along with it, if I hadn't argued, would you even be here right now?"

 

_Of course I would be, don't be stupid_ , he opened his mouth to say.

 

"No," she cut him off. "Think about it. Really _think_. You only ever come to me when you need—" she hesitated, found the word she wanted, "—comfort. Reassurance. Always. That's not love, Sherlock. That's... something else. Dependence. Not love."

 

She broke eye contact, swigged her tea like it was whiskey.

 

Just like that, she'd neatly eviscerated him. It only hurt because it was true.

 

He took a step back, set his mug down. Turned, walked away. There was nothing he could say, no rebuttal, no cutting final remark.

 

He put on his coat, left.

 

*

 

Everything hurt. He ached down to his bones with cold, with craving, with heartbreak. He sneered at himself, his weakness.

 

He laughed bitterly to himself when he realized he'd ended up in front of Mycroft's.

 

He really was a child; when one source of comfort didn't give him what he wanted, he'd gone to something older, deeper. Next he'd start sucking his thumb again.

 

He let himself in anyway.

 

Mycroft sat in his study gazing into the fireplace. He swirled his tumbler of scotch and sipped it; acknowledgment. There was a second one waiting on the table. It was a test, everything was always a test. At least Mycroft knew alcohol had never been his vice.

 

He flopped into the second chair, stretched his legs out, tipped his head back to look at the plasterwork of the ceiling.

 

He waited for some snide comment about goldfish, about distraction, about the folly of sentiment.

 

"And how are you planning on fixing it?" _Show your work. Identify the steps. If_ a _leads to_ b _, what can we surmise about_ c _?_

 

"What's the point in trying when she obviously doesn't want me to?"

 

"Indeed." Disagreement. "And what of everything else that happened yesterday?"

 

"I have context," he said simply, word choice deliberate.

 

He wouldn't be letting the lies go anytime soon but, by the light of day, the whole experience had brought him an unexpected measure of peace. Seeing the printed solution for that one word he just couldn't get in yesterday's crossword.

 

The future was all that really mattered.

 

*

 

He wondered if she trusted him to stay clean, or if she'd finally washed her hands of him.

 

Three days and not a word. No texts; no breathy, awkward voicemails; nothing.

 

He hadn't tried to contact her, either.

 

Well, he had tried, but he'd been doing an excellent job of getting in his own way.

 

**It's not dependence, you're more than that. SH**

 

**Thinking of you gone was like walking into a dark room after being outside on a bright day. SH**

 

**I would cut out my own heart before I let you be hurt again. SH**

 

**I can't change the past, but please let me try to make a future where I'm worthy enough to be by your side. SH**

 

He deleted every text, disgusted with himself. Too purple, too inadequate; words meant nothing.

 

Three words had got him into this. Three words; a noose, a scaffold, and a lever.

 

The worst part was the niggling fear she'd been right. That she'd always been a guide line, a crutch, a fix. What had he ever done for her? When had he ever offered her comfort, shored her up when she was weak?

 

She was never weak. Apart from that one time, when he'd tried to help her, but it had ended up being about himself and his need just as much as hers.

 

Why then, after so long, did she still love him?

 

Maybe she knew more about dependence than he'd previously thought.

 

*

 

Friday night he found himself outside her flat.

 

He knocked this time.

 

She let him in; cautious, resigned.

 

At least he still made her feel something toward him.

 

"I'm not high." Solid opening. "And I'm not here because I need reassurance or comfort. Tell me what I need to do to prove it to you."

 

Voice even, no pleading. Good.

 

"Prove what, Sherlock?"

 

Right to the point. Wasn't expecting that, thought she'd retreat with an offer of tea, regroup, flank him with her disappointment in his character, her sadness.

 

Head on, then. Nuclear Option.

 

"That I love you."

 

Her eyes went wide, momentarily blinded by the flash of it; she barely wobbled against the shockwave.

 

He waited for the fallout.

 

"Wh—" Her lips formed a question, a refutation. She looked up at him, held his gaze.

 

Then, quietly, "You mean it."

 

"Yes." A flutter of hope behind his ribs. He couldn't look away from her eyes even if he wanted to.

 

She took a step closer. "So what... What now?"

 

He leaned in, gave her ample time to react. The kiss was nothing like any of the others. There was no hunger, no grief, no punishment, it wasn't meant to excite or enflame; it was a question and a vow.

 

She surged into the kiss, one hand coming to rest on his chest, over his heart, the other sliding around his neck.

 

It was _yes, always_ ; it was _only you, only ever you_. It was _forever_. It was.

 

He imagined the ashes of all the bitterness and pain and missed opportunities falling around them like snow.

 

 


End file.
